Flashman at the Charge. George Fraser MacDonald
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said – Flashman had a knack of knowing what hurt, and by a cutting word or look could bring tears to the eyes of people who would have laughed at a blow? Something like that; anyway, I’d taken the starch out of friend Cutts, and spoiled his evening, which was just nuts to me.
I took up with Speed and the greenhorn, who was now waxing voluble in the grip of booze, and off we went. I thought it would be capital sport to take him along to one of the accommodation houses in Haymarket, and get him paired off with a whore in a galloping wheelbarrow race, for it was certain he’d never been astride a female in his life, and it would have been splendid to see them bumping across the floor together on hands and knees towards the winning post. But we stopped off for punch on the way, and the little snirp got so fuddled he couldn’t even walk. We helped him along, but he was maudlin, so we took off his trousers in an alley off Regent Street, painted his arse with blacking which we bought for a penny on the way, and then shouted, ‘Come on, peelers! Here’s the scourge of A Division waiting to set about you! Come on and be damned to you!’ And as soon as the bobbies hove in sight we cut, and left them to find our little friend, nose down in the gutter with his black bum sticking up in the air.
I went home well pleased that night, only wishing I could have been present when Dr Winter came face to face again with his erring pupil.
And that night’s work changed my life, and preserved India for the British Crown – what do you think of that? It’s true enough, though, as you’ll see.
However, the fruits didn’t appear for a few days after that, and in the meantime another thing happened which also has a place in my story. I renewed an old acquaintance, who was to play a considerable part in my affairs over the next few months – and that was full of consequence, too, for him, and me, and history.
I had spent the day keeping out of Paget’s way at the Horse Guards, and chatting part of the time, I remember, with Colonel Colt, the American gun expert, who was there to give evidence before the select committee on fire-arms.6 (I ought to remember our conversation, but I don’t, so it was probably damned dull and technical.) Afterwards, however, I went up to Town to meet Elspeth in the Ride, and take her on to tea with one of her Mayfair women.
She was side-saddling it up the Ride, wearing her best mulberry rig and a plumed hat, and looking ten times as fetching as any female in view. But as I trotted up alongside, I near as not fell out of my saddle with surprise, for she had a companion with her, and who should it be but my Lord Haw-Haw himself, the Earl of Cardigan.
I don’t suppose I had exchanged a word with him – indeed, I had hardly seen him, and then only at a distance – since he had packed me off to India fourteen years before. I had loathed the brute then, and time hadn’t softened the sentiment; he was the swine who had kicked me out of the Cherrypickers for (irony of ironies) marrying Elspeth, and committed me to the horrors of the Afghan campaign.fn1 And here he was, getting spoony round my wife, whom he had affected to despise once on a day for her lowly origins. And spooning to some tune, too, by the way he was leaning confidentially across from his saddle, his rangy old boozy face close to her blonde and beautiful one, and the little slut was laughing and looking radiant at his attentions.
She caught my eye and waved, and his lordship looked me over in his high-nosed damn-you way which I remembered so well. He would be in his mid-fifties by now, and it showed; the whiskers were greying, the gooseberry eyes were watery, and the legions of bottles he had consumed had cracked the veins in that fine nose of his. But he still rode straight as a lance, and if his voice was wheezy it had lost nothing of its plunger drawl.
‘Haw, haw,’ says he, ‘it is Fwashman, I see. Where have you been sir? Hiding away these many years, I daresay, with this lovely lady. Haw-haw. How-de-do, Fwashman? Do you know, my dear’ – this to Elspeth, damn his impudence – ‘I decware that this fine fellow, your husband, has put on fwesh alarmingly since last I saw him. Haw-haw. Always was too heavy for a wight dwagoon, but now – pwepostewous! You feed him too well, my dear! Haw-haw!’
It was a damned lie, of course, no doubt designed to draw a comparison with his own fine figure – scrawny, some might have thought it. I could have kicked his lordly backside, and given him a piece of my mind.
‘Good day, milord,’ says I, with my best toady smile. ‘May I say how well your lordship is looking? In good health, I trust.’
‘Thank’ee,’ says he, and turning to Elspeth: ‘As I was saying, we have the vewy finest hunting at Deene. Spwendid sport, don’t ye know, and specially wecommended for young wadies wike yourself. You must come to visit – you too, Fwashman. You wode pwetty well, as I wecollect. Haw-haw.’
‘You honour me with the recollection, milord,’ says I, wondering what would happen if I smashed him between the eyes. ‘But I—’
‘Yaas,’ says he, turning languidly back to Elspeth. ‘No doubt your husband has many duties – in the ordnance, is it not, or some such thing? Haw-haw. But you must come down, my dear, with one of your fwiends, for a good wong stay, what? The faiwest bwossoms bwoom best in countwy air, don’t ye know? Haw-haw.’ And the old scoundrel had the gall to lean over and pat her hand.
She, the little ninny, was all for it, giving him a dazzling smile and protesting he was too, too kind – this aged satyr who was old enough to be her father and had vice leering out of every wrinkle in his face. Of course, where climbing little snobs like Elspeth are concerned, there ain’t such a thing as an ugly peer of the realm, but even she could surely have seen how grotesque his advances were. Of course, women love it.
‘How splendid to see you two old friends together again, after such a long time, is it not, Lord Cardigan? Why, I declare I have never seen you in his lordship’s company, Harry! Such a dreadfully long time it must have been!’ Babbling, you see, like the idiot she was. I’m not sure she didn’t say something about ‘comrades in arms’. ‘You must call upon us, Lord Cardigan, now that you and Harry have met again. It will be so fine, will it not, Harry?’
‘Yaas,’ says he. ‘I may call,’ with a look at me that said he would never dream of setting foot in any hovel of mine. ‘In the meantime, my dear, I shall wook to see you widing hereabouts. Haw-haw. I dewight to see a female who wides so gwacefully. Decidedwy you must come to Deene. Haw-haw.’ He took off his hat to her, bowing from the waist – and a Polish hussar couldn’t have done it better, damn him. ‘Good day to you, Mrs Fwashman.’ He gave me the merest nod, and cantered off up the Ride, cool as you please.
‘Is he not wonderfully condescending, Harry? Such elegant manners – but of course, it is natural in one of such noble breeding. I am sure if you spoke to him, my dear, he would be ready to give the most earnest consideration to finding a place for you – he is so kind, despite his high station. Why, he has promised me almost any favour I care to ask – Harry, whatever is the matter? Why are you swearing – oh, my love, no, people will hear! Oh!’
Of course, swearing and prosing were both lost on Elspeth; when I had vented my bile against Cardigan I tried to point out to her the folly of accepting the attentions of such a notorious roué, but she took this as mere jealousy on my part – not jealousy of a sexual kind, mark you, but supposedly rooted in the fact that here she was climbing in the social world, spooned over by peers, while I was labouring humbly in an office like any Cratchit, and could not abide to see her ascending so far above me. She even reminded me that she was a baron’s daughter, at which I ground my teeth and hurled a boot through our bedroom window, she burst into tears, and ran from the room to take refuge in a broom cupboard, whence she refused to budge while I hammered on the panels. She was terrified of my brutal ways, she said, and feared for her life, so I had to go through the charade of forcing open the door and rogering her in the cupboard before peace was restored. (This was what she had wanted since the quarrel began, you see; very curious and wearing our domestic situation was, but strangely enjoyable, too, as I look back on it. I remember how I carried her to the bedroom afterwards, she nibbling at my ear with her arms round my neck, and at the sight of the broken window we collapsed giggling and kissing on the floor. Aye, married bliss. And like the fool I was I clean forgot to forbid her to talk to Cardigan again.)
But